Dr. Anthony Montag, a pathology professor and associate dean for admissions at the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, was a role model for many and known for caring about students.

“When I got to the University of Chicago, I didn’t really know if I wanted to be a pathologist,” said Dr. Kenneth Wind, who trained at the university from 1992 to 1997.

“When I met Dr. Montag, I felt like he was a true mentor and someone I could model myself after. It just turned my whole life around,” said Wind, now attending pathologist at Presence Saint Joseph Hospital in Chicago and a mentor to medical students at Rosalind Franklin University in North Chicago.

Montag’s clinical focus was on bone, soft tissue and gynecologic tumors, and his research centered on metastasis.

Montag, whose career at U. of C. spanned more than 30 years, died of prostate cancer Nov. 9 in his Hyde Park home, according to his wife, Dr. Katherine Griem. He was 64.

Montag grew up in Woodbine, Iowa, where his father was a large animal veterinarian. His education began in a one-room schoolhouse and continued in a high school with about 60 students, his wife said.

“He was always very interested in science, and had a very good science teacher (there),” she said. His choice of a career in medicine grew out of his interest in helping others.

He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Iowa State University in three years with a degree in invertebrate zoology, then got a medical degree with honors from the Medical College of Wisconsin in 1979. He completed his residency in pathology at the Medical College of Wisconsin in 1982, followed by a three-year clinical fellowship at the Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston.

Montag joined the U. of C. faculty in 1985 becoming a pathology professor and admissions dean.

Dana Levinson, an administrative dean, got to know Montag well as both a leader and a person and said he was a perfect fit in his admissions role.

“Tony really appreciated people for their unique qualities and their unique gifts,” she said.

In a medical school of 88 first-year students, Montag’s approach was critical to ensuring diversity.

“He really understood that a medical school needed to be built from very diverse groups, and he made it part of the mission of what the admissions team did,” said Levinson. “To be robust, we really need to be rich in diversity. Tony truly understood that. His work was transformative.”

Montag also served in larger regional and national committee assignments. He was the author or co-author of nearly 200 scientific papers, case reports, book chapters and abstracts, primarily on gynecologic and bone cancers.

Montag found making the diagnosis was the most interesting part of medicine for him, according to Griem, who said during his training he won awards as a clinician.

For his teaching, Montag was chosen by medical students many times as a favorite faculty member. He received the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society teaching award and was recognized as a clinical peer mentor and a fellow of the Academy of Distinguished Medical Educators at Pritzker.

Levinson called Montag a total mensch, a trustworthy person of integrity, kind and generous.

“His kindness and his sense of humor were such that you might not realize right away how brilliant he was,” she said. “Not just smart, but wise.”

Survivors also include a daughter, Caroline; two sons Hugh and William; a sister, Liesa Montag-Siegel; and three brothers Maurice, Christopher and Sean.